


and both shall row

by bastaerd



Category: The Terror (TV 2018)
Genre: Fluff, Getting Together, M/M, Sharing a Bed
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-08
Updated: 2020-08-08
Packaged: 2021-03-05 22:06:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,065
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25782586
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bastaerd/pseuds/bastaerd
Summary: “Not Mr. Gibson, sir,” Jopson said, and, smile slipping, added, “if it pleases you, of course.”“I wasn’t expecting you,” Little said, clearing his throat. “That’s all.”“I sent Mr. Gibson away after he finished with Lieutenant Hodgson. I thought he could use the rest.”“After the day we’ve had.”Jopson nodded.“After the day we’ve had."
Relationships: Thomas Jopson/Lt Edward Little
Comments: 12
Kudos: 55





	and both shall row

**Author's Note:**

> title taken from the song _the water is wide,_ a song that knocks me on my ass no matter which version i listen to.

An aptly-named ship, the Terror, Lieutenant Little thought to himself. Very fucking aptly named. He had never found it in himself to tend towards superstition, but at the moment, he couldn’t help but curse the bastard who had named the vessel, as if a name could channel misfortune like a lightning rod in a storm. His hand was still curled into the approximate shape of the gun Crozier had passed him, and his palm practically rang with the feeling even though he had dropped it as soon as it was in his grasp.

Worse than that is in his nostrils. Blood had run in rivulets from Blanky’s leg, pumped thickly out of it in such volumes that it slicked the table he was sat on and even dripped to the floor. The stump bled even freer, no less grisly than the mauled limb before its amputation. There was a smear of blood on Little’s cuff, and he stared at it, recalling the events of the day. The entire damned day. Frost was still melting in his whiskers and now he had another man’s blood on his clothing, and that was to say nothing of Hornby, who had collapsed on the ice barely five paces from him, dead before he even hit the ground. Suddenly, Little found that he could not sit on the edge of his berth and let his thoughts bowl him over, and stood to pace around his quarters as much as the space allowed him.

Such behavior was unfitting of an officer in public, he reminded himself. In Crozier’s stead, the men would look to him, if not for leadership, then for instruction when instruction was required, and he needed to leave his reservations out of sight. He may not have wanted the duty, but he had it now, whether he liked it or not.

But, god, he had watched a man get his leg sawed off after having it mauled by a danger that was still very much present. This situation called not for a captain-- though the only captain it could possibly call for was currently in the beginning stages of his convalescence-- but for… _but for..._

A polite knock at the door pulled Little from his thoughts.

“Come in, Gibson,” he called, straightening his back and facing the entryway. Thomas Jopson pushed the door open, offered him a smile, which was wry, but still cheery in that befuddling way of his, and let it close again behind him.

“Not Mr. Gibson, sir,” he said, and, smile slipping, added, “if it pleases you, of course.”

 _Of course,_ Little wanted to say, in the same way he wanted Jopson to call him by his Christian name. The surprise must have shown on his face, because Jopson’s self-assured path towards him stuttered, then halted entirely.

“I wasn’t expecting you,” Little said, clearing his throat. “That’s all.”

“I sent Mr. Gibson away after he finished with Lieutenant Hodgson,” Jopson explained. “I thought he could use the rest.”

“After the day we’ve had.”

Jopson nodded.

“After the day we’ve had,” he agreed, that stubborn lock of hair falling into his face and across one eye. Little’s hands twitched at the same time Jopson tucked the strand back in place. He had not missed the fact that Jopson had dismissed the other steward at the right time to have Little alone, with no obligations left waiting for the night. Morning would come, and with it, new responsibilities for the both of them. For now, though, there was only night.

“Sir?”

Little blinked, and found Jopson much closer than he had been a moment earlier. His hands were poised at the buttons of his heavy coat, his expression questioning. Little shook himself out of it and nodded for him to go on, and Jopson’s focus returned to his work. The man had fingers like a pianist’s, Little thought to himself, graceful and long enough to easily span an octave, and then some. The thought of Jopson using his hands to bring lovely sounds out of anything threatened a flush in his cheeks, but Jopson, evidently not a mind-reader, continued down the outermost layer until it fell open. Little shouldered out of his coat and handed it over to Jopson, who folded it properly and hung it in its proper place.

They continued on like that, silent and diligent. The silence only added to the strange intimacy of being undressed by another man, an intimacy which Little had never felt when it was Gibson undoing his buttons. Jopson was gentle, attentive, and often looked to Little’s face as if gauging his reactions, and when he did, Little felt as if he should say something. Put an effort to make conversation, if only to keep Jopson there a moment longer, or, better yet, to hear that voice of his, the even tone of his voice, secure and unruffled in a way Little so often was not. Did his fingers stay poised around the button at his wrist a split second longer than was necessary, or had it been a figment of his imagination? If so, had it been accidental or deliberate, a message meant only for him? Should he, then, leave a message of his own? Would that message even be received, uptight and buttoned-down as he was known to be?

It occurred to him, then, that Jopson had been trying to gain his attention for longer than he should have, and now his brow was creased in mild concern.

“Are you feeling quite well, sir?” Jopson asked. Little straightened his back and nodded firmly, feeling as if he was in front of Fitzjames again, only this time caught in a worse lie.

“Well enough, Jopson,” he answered, “thank you.”

Jopson gave a nod at that, looking curtailed.

“If I may say so… thank you, also, for relieving Gibson, tonight,” Little rushed to add. “I appreciate a friendly face. I mean no offense to him, of course.”

“Happy to help, sir,” said Jopson, with one of those tight, polite smiles of his. “And if there is anything you might require of me, over the coming-”

“There will be no need, I’m sure.”

The words came out harsher and ruder than Little had meant them, which was to say, not harsh or rude at all. Even Jopson looked momentarily surprised, but he was much more well-versed in putting on a veil of decorum, which took the blows of others’ impropriety. Clearing his throat, Little made to amend himself.

“Pardon, Jopson, but you will have your hands even fuller than they regularly are,” he explained, apologetic. “I couldn’t ask you to divide your attention further, especially if doing so will mean you have less of it to spend on the captain.”

“I _am_ a steward, sir,” Jopson replied. “And I suppose that, with Captain Crozier indisposed, you will be the captain in all but formal rank.” With a short, upward motion of his eyebrows, he added, “I imagine it would be rather as if I were to take on the role of a lieutenant.”

His face colored about the cheeks, and he did a good job of hiding it by troubling himself with a loose thread, but Little still spotted a pale pink flush at the tips of his ears. From it, he caught a whiff of courage.

“I would imagine so,” he agreed, “only I think you would wear the rank of lieutenant far better than I could wear captaincy.” 

On a wild impulse, he reached out, and when Jopson moved as if he had been blocking his way from something, placed his hand on Jopson’s shoulder. He felt it square under his palm as Jopson drew up, but, curiously, not away. It was that that sent a spark of hope dancing in his chest, like a lit lantern during the polar night. At the same time, he reminded himself that, even if he was acting captain in Crozier’s absence, Fitzjames could still dole out a punishment for him, should Jopson choose to report him for his behavior.

“I imagine you might even correct your own steward,” Little added despite himself, his voice dipping lower so that even if someone were to stick his head through the door, he still would not overhear, “as to how to properly affix your own epaulettes.”

One of Jopson’s eyebrows lifted, though his hands did not falter in their work, untying Little’s neck scarf and pulling the soft silk free of itself.

“Not impolitely, I hope,” he said. “I was a novice at this once, too, sir. A time ago. May have affixed an officer’s epaulettes backwards, in my early days of it.”

“Did you?”

“Unfortunately.”

Jopson smiled a little, despite himself, the kind of smile that only came at the expense of oneself when distanced enough from the point of embarrassment to laugh at it. Little found it categorically entrancing, and wondered if, years down the line, this would be a moment he smiled about in that same way.

“It seemed everyone noticed but me,” Jopson went on. “I went through the entire dinner oblivious. It was as if the officers around the table couldn’t tell if I had done it as a practical joke, or by accident, not knowing better. Every time I refilled one of their drinks, they would give me a look, trying to discern which of the two I was, wondering when I would realize my error.”

He paused, Little’s neck scarf in both of his hands, his eyes on the soft material. It was taught at the back of Little’s neck, keeping his head in place, but if he pushed back against it, it would surely have given way. He did not want to, though, did not want to be any farther from Jopson than he already stood, and there was scant space to speak of between the two of them. A whisper could have easily bridged it. Jopson seemed to appraise the distance before finally lifting his head. He stepped forward; there was not much forward left to go, and his leading foot ended up between Little’s. His hands, still holding the scarf, pressed against Little’s chest, above his hammering heart. If Jopson noticed it, he politely said nothing, but pulled that same half-sad smile as his face neared Little’s.

“Edward,” he said, and, as if obeying a command, Edward wrapped his arms around Thomas. Thomas’ nose pushed against Edward’s cheek first, followed by warm breath against his whiskers. If there had been frost left in them, that breath would have melted it, if it had not first been melted by the heat of proximity, or even from the pervasive warmth Edward felt when he noticed Thomas in the same room or heard his name.

“Thomas,” he answered. Thomas’ mouth pressed against his cheek. There came a breath, and then a more deliberate press of lips to the same spot. Through the corner of his eye, Edward could see Thomas’ own fall closed. He lifted a hand to Thomas’ cheek and guided him so that they were centered on each other, their foreheads touching and their noses nearly there. Thomas’ eyes didn’t open, but his eyebrows went up, and his lips turned upwards just enough to notice.

“I had a feeling,” Thomas said, after enough time had passed that several breaths had dissipated against Edward’s mouth. “I’ve seen you, Lieutenant Little, with your eyes on me. Wondered once or twice if you’d seen mine on you, or if, like I had, you’d told yourself it was only your imagination.”

“That I’d been deluding myself into seeing what I wanted, despite a lack of evidence,” Edward agreed, finding Thomas’ waist again and laying his hands there. Thomas, who had since let go of the scarf, held Edward’s face, his thumbs resting along the hidden edge of Edward’s jawline.

“All that wishful thinking,” he said with a sigh that Edward felt against his face. “Not once in all of it did I think you might allow me so close, after all.”

“Allow you,” Edward repeated. He gave a short, quiet laugh that went the same way as Thomas’ sigh. “You have the run of me, Mr. Jopson.”

Thomas only laughed at that, his eyes crinkling in amusement at the corners.

“As if you’re the captain’s pantry,” he joked. Though his voice was light, his tone jovial, something passed over him and took some of the buoyancy out of him as he said it. Edward was reminded, then, of his trips to Erebus and back again, sent less like a lieutenant and more like an enemy spy to steal from the other captain’s stores. To go from a thieving rogue in a frock coat to, as Thomas had put it, captain in all but formal rank. For Thomas to go from steward to nursemaid. Edward drew in a breath and tightened his hold on Thomas, his arms settling at the small of his back as if they were already familiar with the spot and sought it out out of habit. Thomas exhaled in a way Edward recognized as a sigh.

“There is no harm in leaning on each other in the upcoming weeks,” he said, and it was evident in his tone that there would be much work ahead for them both. “I can’t say I would mind helping you, where I can, if ever I find myself faced with an overabundance of time and nothing with which to fill it.”

Edward hummed wordlessly, the side of his face pressed against Thomas’ smooth cheek.

“I would welcome it,” he told him. They remained like that for some time still, holding each other with only the soft snoring that passed through the walls and the otherworldly yawning of the ship’s architecture around them to keep them company. Otherwise, it might as well just have been the two of them, the rest of the world fallen away entirely. Edward certainly would not have noticed if it had.

Suddenly, Thomas drew back, and Edward copied him, eyebrows raised as he listened for footsteps approaching in the passageway. Thomas, though, only gave a short laugh.

“I had forgotten the date until now,” he remarked, and when Edward cocked his head, he gave his flank a playfully admonishing pinch. “Happy birthday, Edward.”

That this expedition had turned Edward into the kind of man who forgot his own birthday came as no surprise, after all that happened since setting sail-- to be more precise, all that had happened since the ice had closed in on them for good. He knew, also, that he might very well die before turning another year older, which, as a sailor, he had long known on an objective level, the same way he knew that the sky was blue and the Mediterranean was warm and sunny. It was a fact with which he only just begun to grapple since the first three of their dead had been buried at Beechey, though, and now, with the creature at their heels, it was much harder to put the thought of it out of mind.

He tucked his nose against Thomas’ cheek and kissed the place that dimpled when he smiled.

* * *

The crews rang in the new year with their ox cheek soup and veal cutlets with tomato, and the officers with much the same, plus the memory of Christmas pudding. By the way Hodgson went on about it, one would think it was the elixir of the gods, rather than colorless and slightly too spongey. Little had gone most of the day with a roaring headache, and was only too glad to retreat to his quarters when he finished writing his report. At that point, it was so late that even the most dedicated rabble-rousers had turned in for the night, and there had fallen a silence over the two ships that would have been peaceful, if it had not been so damned eerie.

Blinking until things came back into focus, Little stood from his desk, one hand set on the surface and his weight against it so as not to send himself off-balance as he rubbed at his bleary eyes. Every day felt remarkably the same as the last, as though the ice had frozen time in as firmly as it did Erebus and Terror, but it was as if they had left on an entirely new expedition sometime in the past year without volunteering for it. For him, it seemed as though he had set sail the moment Crozier had handed him his sidearm. To now spend his time helping plan a party… to say it did not sit well with him would be to put it lightly. Even if it did raise the men’s morale, as was Fitzjames’ hope, it would come at the cost of supplies, more with which than Little was comfortable with parting. Irving was keeping a strict tally of their inventory, and discussed it regularly with the rest of the officers, and it was clear that their stock was already dwindling. They did not need a carnival to help speed that process along.

There was a knock at his door, and Little, cradling his head, called out, “Come in, Gibson.” The door scraped against the floor as it slid first open, then closed.

“Not Gibson, sir.”

Little raised his head, and, just as he had three weeks ago, met Thomas’ eyes. Unlike three weeks ago, there was nothing restraining him from breaking into a wide, delighted smile at the sight of him. At the sight of it, Thomas smiled similarly, and approached.

“Aren’t I glad of that,” Edward said. Thomas’ hands were already at his buttons, undoing them deftly; not with the careful quickness of a steward, but with the affectionate ease of someone more invested. His sleeves were rucked up to his elbows, his shirt bunched up in his sweater where it had started to slip. Edward imagined him absentmindedly pushing his fallen sleeve back up again while reaching for a cool rag with which to dab at the captain’s brow. Thomas nodded, looked up from his work, and pressed that smile of his to the corner of Edward’s mouth, kissing him there. Edward closed his eyes, letting the day exert its full effects upon him, bringing his shoulders down from their rigid posture and stooping his back. As he wilted towards Thomas, Thomas gave a huff of a laugh and caught him in his arms, propping him upright.

“You should be already in bed,” he admonished him, but his voice held no bite. Edward hummed in vague acknowledgement. “I confess, when I knocked on your door, I thought that there was a chance I might wake you, and an even greater chance that you wouldn’t hear me at all.”

Sliding his arms under Edward’s armpits, he walked him backwards to his bed, the two of them engaging in an odd, shuffling waltz that lasted until the backs of Edward’s knees hit his mattress.

“But here you are, awake enough to grant me entrance,” Thomas continued, depositing Edward there; Edward sank down and back, slouching petulantly so that Thomas had to lean over him to get at the rest of his buttons.

“Hmm, I would love to grant you entrance,” Edward muttered, and a trace of a smile lit his face as Thomas gave him a pinch on the arm-- soft, just enough to feel sharply one moment and nothing the next. He lifted himself and helped to pull his coat down off of his arms, and as soon as Thomas returned to him from having deposited it where it would not develop undue creases, raised his hand to him, the backs of his knuckles brushing the smooth cheek, the square jawline, following it down to Thomas’ chin as he undid Edward’s neckscarf and extracted it from his collar. There, Edward brushed the pad of his thumb softly to Thomas’ bottom lip, applying only enough pressure to part his mouth before Thomas took his wrist and held it. He kissed Edward’s palm, lingering against the heel of it and warming it with his breath.

“Tom.”

“The captain is asleep, at the moment,” Thomas explained, speaking into Edward’s hand still. “Dr. McDonald is with him at the moment. He relieved me-- says he plans to keep vigil the rest of the night, so that I might catch some sleep, myself.”

“Tom,” Edward said again. He reached out for him, and, with a hand on his shoulder, pulled Thomas down and onto him so that he lay against Edward’s chest, and Edward against the wall behind him. It was a horribly uncomfortable way to sit, especially after having been up and about since the early hours of the morning-- though with the dark sky, each day seemed to hang in a state of perpetual midnight-- and, with a hand around Thomas’ back, he resituated the two of them so that they lay along his bed. Thomas’ shoulders lifted and then fell again in a long, full sigh. With his hand resting on Thomas’ back, between his shoulder blades, Edward could feel the clamminess of sweat that had permeated through his shirt and his sweater.

“I am no medical expert,” he said, “but I have to agree with Dr. McDonald. You have been working all day-- more than that.”

Thomas scoffed; “Hardly more than you, Lieutenant.”

“And,” Edward went on, as if Thomas had said nothing, but paused to bump his lips against his temple in a clumsy sort of kiss, “I find myself in dire need of a good night’s sleep, as well. The trouble is that my mind is alert at all hours, now, even when my body wants nothing more than to collapse in bed. If…”

Here, his courage petered out, and he cut himself off, blinking as Thomas raised his head from where it had been pillowed against Edward’s clavicle, where his shoulder met his chest. Thomas gave him a tired, indulgent smile.

“I’d like that,” he answered, patting Edward’s chest. Then, through a yawn, he said, “If I’m being honest, I think I would suffer the same issue, if not for my Ned, inviting me to share his bed with him.”

He could stand the endearment, coming from Thomas, Edward thought to himself, too tired to be shocked by Thomas’ words. In fact, he could very well stand being Thomas’. He gathered Thomas more solidly in his arms, Thomas shifting as the two of them accommodated each other.

“You really would care to share my bed with me?” Edward asked, and then flushed upon hearing himself. Thomas laughed, muffling the sound against his shoulder.

“Well, we would have a harder time trying to share mine,” he joked, “given how narrow it is. If the ships weren’t frozen in, we would both be thrown to the floor at the slightest pitch of the water.”

“Oh, you know what I…”

Edward’s words trailed off in a soft laugh. Thomas turned on his side, keeping one hand on Edward’s far shoulder until he, too, turned over. They faced each other now, rather like husband and wife, if husband and wife were both sailors. The notion made something in Edward’s chest ache sweetly, such as a bruise when pressed under one’s thumb.

“Your Ned,” he said, taking great care now to keep his voice just loud enough for Thomas to hear, barely a rasp of breath. “I am, rather. I... “

Here, he trailed off again. Thomas waited for him to go on; he found his hand and brought it to his lips. Edward found himself transfixed a moment, heartened by the reality between them, and, at the same time, chastised by the existence of hope. There was no denying that with Thomas laid his future, however it would come.

“Would you say it again?”

“Pardon?”

Edward struggled to articulate himself; Thomas plucked the thought from his head.

“Ah,” he said. On a whisper-- “My Ned.”

The syllables sighed out of him, alighting on Edward’s lips as if he had breathed them himself. He felt as though air had been pulled from his own lungs to form them. He breathed with Thomas. Thomas breathed with him.

“Your Ned,” Edward agreed as Thomas drew himself up to him. “My Tom, then.”

“He says, as though there’s any question of it.”

And Thomas pressed his smiling lips to Edward’s.

**Author's Note:**

> catch me on [tumblr](http://harrydsgoodsir.tumblr.com).


End file.
